HAMILTON — The spirit of Joe Logue is alive and well and now living in the halls of Nottingham High School.

After a 2011 season in which the three Hamilton Township football teams shared the Joe Logue Trophy — named after the late, legendary Trentonian sportswriter and given to winner of the township round robin series — the Northstars regained exclusive rights to the hardware with a convincing 28-0 victory at Hamilton West’s Homecoming Saturday.

“It means a lot,” said quarterback Luke Westerberg, who was 6-for-6 for 129 yards and two touchdowns. “It was one of our goals this season, we achieved it today and it feels great.”

It also earned coach Jon Adams his first Gatorade bath since Nottingham beat the Hornets in one of the wildest games ever in 2009.

“They haven’t gotten me wet all year, they seized the opportunity today,” Adams said. “I was coming down the sideline, was trying to give the fist to the fans with time running out and get them all fired up. All of a sudden I got smacked with a water jug.”

But it was a good smack. “It feels great,” Adams said. “When you beat Hamilton West there’s nothing better.”

In a rivalry known for its crazy, close games, each team has won one-sided affairs the past two years. The only suspense in this one was if the Hornets (1-4) would score. But the Northstars (5-0) posted their fourth shutout and the first-string defense is still unscored upon in the 19 quarters it has been on the field.

“When they’re in our territory, we just can’t let them score,” said safety Jamir Jenkins, one of numerous defensive heroes.

Nottingham allowed 220 yards of total offense and forced four turnovers (three interceptions), and 25 percent of those yards came on a late 62-yard run by Mark McKenzie (124 yards). That helped set up a second-and-goal at the 4-yard line. But Jenkins, who had an earlier interception, dropped Ruben Desane for an 8-yard loss.

“That brought our confidence up a lot more than it was,” said linebacker Ryan Malagrino, who seemed to be in on every play.

The Hornets then threw two incomplete passes and the shutout was secure with less than three minutes remaining.

Offensively, Nottingham continued to rotate Westerberg and Stephen Adams, and it was Westerberg’s turn to star. His first snap produced a 48-yard touchdown pass to the dangerous Jameel Bailey.

The Northstars got two 1-yard scoring runs in the second quarter from Josh Lajeunesse and Wroway Williams, and Nottingham sealed the scoring on Kylik Self’s 10-yard TD catch in the final quarter.

A rotating running back system of Lajeunesse, Williams and Alexis Santiago combined for 144 yards as Nottingham grinded out the clock in the second half.

Lajeunesse, who had to sit out last season, also had two interceptions that resulted in 73 yards of returns.

“This feels great because last year they dug into us,” Lajeunesse said. “I missed the game, but we wanted revenge and we came here with a mindset that ‘It’s their homecoming, they’ve got a lot of fans, but we’re just going to isolate that out and play the game on the field.’ We did, and it just feels good to be back and playing.”

And winning trophies. — Follow Rich Fisher on twitter @fish4scores and on fish4scores.com.